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This website is devoted to the care and well-being of all rabbits, and focuses on pet rabbits kept as indoor members of the family.

Last site update: Sun Jun 28 21:49:23 EDT 2020

Spay/Neuter

Altering Your Rabbit's Future

FAQ: Spaying and Neutering

Spay or Neuter my Rabbit?!

Rabbit Spay/Neuter Preparations

Why You Should Spay or Neuter Your Pet

Spaying & Neutering

Spaying/Neutering a Rabbit

Spaying & Neutering

Health and Behavior Benefits of Having Your Bunny Fixed

To Breed Or Not To Breed

Spay/Neuter

Check out my book on pet rabbit care and socialization, and I'm always updating it. The book is copyright-protected but available for free, though I request a $1 donation for the bunnies and for my efforts. C'mon, what's a buck?

Spay/Neuter Your Bunny!!

One of the most important things you can do for your rabbit's health and well-being is to spay or neuter him or her.

First an foremost, spaying/neutering your bunny will help it to calm down and it will be much easier to deal with. Unspayed females have better than an 80% chance of developing reproductive cancer by age three. Unneutered males will spray to mark their territory. If only more people would spay/neuter their bunnies, there would be much fewer bunnies dumped at shelters abnd rescues due to behavioral issues.

Spay/neuter can go along way towards avoiding urinary tract infections, uterine cancer, uterine disease, mammary gland disease, testicular cancer, and of course, it will prevent unwanted pregnancies. It will also make your rabbit mellower and easier to get along with. Behavioral problems as a result of hormones gone wild during adolescence accounts for nearly all the dumps/abandonments/etc of young rabbits (those who didn't die in the first few weeks, of unintentional neglect). If people had been prepared to take proper care of the bunny, and get it spayed/neutered when the time was right, they would have discovered how wonderful bunnies really are as house pets.

Like humans, rabbits go through an adolescence of wildly shifting hormones, and just like humans, they act out. Males, and some females, spray - this has nothing to do with litterbox habits and it is not something they can control - the hormones are causing it. The best way to solve this problem is to have your rabbit altered (spay for females, neuter for males) and then after about a motnh (for the hormones to clear) the rabbit will calm down, be much easier to deal with, and you will have a wonderful companion and member of the family.

If you have more than one rabbit, regardless of their sexes, altering them also will make them much less likely to behave aggressively towards each other (which could result in serious injury or even death).

Female rabbits can become pregnant almost immediately after giving birth, so even if your bunny has just had a litter, that doesn't mean she can't get started on another one.

Some reasons for preventing your rabbit from breeding include:

  • Behavioral issues caused by raging hormones (spraying, aggression, etc)
  • Unspayed females have a better than 85% chance of developing uterine and/or ovarian cancer by the age of 3 years
  • Rabbit overpopulation - there are far too many unwanted rabbits in shelters and rescues already. If you want more rabbits, you could rescue them from shelters rather than breed more
  • It is impossible to find good homes for all the offspring (4 to 14 kits) in a litter
  • Untimely death - most rabbits die before their first birthday due to ignorance and/or improper care
  • The rabbits are sold or given away, and ultimately wind up in the hands of people who will use them as dinner for themselves or their snakes


Recommended Reading:

The Bunny Bunch's article on spaying and neutering

The House Rabbit Society's article on the importance of spaying or neutering your rabbit

The House Rabbit Society's FAQ on spaying/neutering

Dana Krempels's article on spaying/neutering

Morfz's page on preparing your bunny for spay/neuter

The Humane Society's article on why you should spay/neuter your pet

PetEducation.com's article on why rabbits should be spayed/neutered

The BCSPCA's article on spaying/neutering rabbits

Dennabun's article on spaying/neutering rabbits

Zooh Corner's article on spaying/neutering your rabbit

The sad realities of rabbit overpopulation and what happens to unwanted kits

An article covering the reasons why you should spay or neuter your bunny


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A Buck for the Bunnies
Last update: Sun Jun 28 21:49:23 EDT 2020